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IS THERE A FAVORITE PARENT?

"You bet I'm the favorite parent," one woman said emphatically during a public reading The Favorite Child. "I'm always around for my kids. I help with homework, make their meals, and take them to practices. When they have something on their mind, it is me they talk to. They are just more comfortable around me than they are around Tom. I know that the kids love both of us but when it comes to favorites, it's me."

How do love and favoritism differ? Why can it be so important for one parent to feel favored? How can one parent's need to be favored impact on their relationship with their partner as well as the relationship of each parent with the children? These are some of the many questions that were stimulated by one parent's publicly disclosing her feelings about wanting to be the favorite parent. The energy this mother stoked in the room suggests that many parents echoed her thoughts and concerns.

Love and favoritism do differ. Love reflects tender feelings of affection, and usually implies strong loyalty or unquestioned devotion. The Wall Street Journal recently featured a story articulating this loyalty and devotion when writing about adult children caring for aging parents. As adults, these children believed that caring for aging parents is what loving children do, and to do so, these children often had to put aside their tension, resentment, and animosity that stemmed from feelings of having been overlooked children when growing up.

Children can love both parents and still favor one over the other. Favorite implies a preference, a stronger pull towards one person rather than another. People, usually aware of their preferences, are often uncomfortable in acknowledging them. The discomfort can be so profound that to mute the choice people may incorrectly employ the word "love" rather than "favorite." This behavior is often observed in children who say they love one parent more than the other when most likely the children are expressing a preference for one parent. Children tend to prefer the parent who lets them stay up later, lets them go out before completing homework, or doesn't insist that clothes be picked up off the floor. Children manipulatively use the lure of being the favorite parent or threat of not being the favorite parent. The challenge for parents is to not be manipulated!

The parent who children prefer reflect a moment in time or the time of life, or be fixed to one parent for most of a lifetime. Children may momentarily favor the parent who is more permissive, or during a stage of life, the parent who the child identifies as most supportive of their athletic, artistic, or intellectual interests. The desire of some parents to be the preferred parent can impede the quality of their parenting. For example, rather than remain firm when telling young drivers that they can't drive on a rainy night, parents who do not want to be unfavored may be more vulnerable to backing down.

It is normal to want to be chosen or selected, but to be the favorite parent does not necessarily equate with being the competent parent. It is the responsibility of adults to provide an atmosphere in which children can mature into physically, emotionally, socially, and intellectually healthy adults. Such an environment requires boundaries, structure, rules, and expectations, which often children do not like. Children grow by coming up against these standards and learning to accommodate to their requirements. In the process, children often do not like the adult who they associate with their displeasure. The needs that adults have to be the favored parent can undermine their abilities to provide the tension in their children's lives that is necessary for their healthy growth.

Some parents are aware of their need to be favored and others are not. Parents in the midst of stressful divorces can find themselves vying to be the preferred parent. In their quest, they often compromise their children's best interests. For example, when one divorced father picked up his five-year-old son to take him to his home, the first stop was the toy store. This practice continued for several years. The father indicated that he wanted his son to prefer being with him and coming to his home rather than being with his mother at her home. The father believed that the ten-dollar price limit per toy would teach his that the size of the gift mattered. Overtime, what the son talked about was his outrage that his father limited him to ten-dollars at toy store.

The desire to be deemed the favorite parent is often more subtle. Stay-at-home moms sometimes resent accolades that their husbands receive from their children, the wives believing that that their husbands receive accolades in their professional lives and accolades at home should be reserved for them. A stay-at-home father recently reflected on his resentment when, over the weekend, their daughter chose to be with her mother rather than him. "My days are all built around her. I'm only coaching her softball team because she wouldn't have made the cut unless I was the coach. And, Saturday, she chose to be with her mother and not practice hitting with me. I can't believe that she wouldn't prefer being with me," he said incredulously.

While the desire to be chosen, to be preferred over someone else, is normal, if left unchecked, the negative repercussions to the parent/child relationship can be profound. To secure their status, parents are vulnerable to making decisions that make children feel good rather than providing an environment necessary for their children's growth. To reduce this likelihood, it is necessary that• Parents be honest with themselves, acknowledging their own needs to be the favorite parent.• Parents grow in understanding that it is not the role of children to affirm the adult.• Parents be receptive to feedback from their partner or best friend, as they observe the misalliance between parent and child.

Can really relate to this article as we are going through this with our 4 year old right now. I'm the favorite and my son complains when his dad picks him up from school and tells him flat out that I'm his favorite. It's so hard to deal with as neither one of us is competing but it's really hurtful to the parent who is not the favorite to hear that all the time and it does affect the flow of the day at times. Not sure how to overcome it but we're working on it!

i am a mom with four children ... 7,5,3, and 1 ... and i am having a really tough time. i know it is NOT the role of children to affirm their parents. and i keep making sure that this is not the case with me or what i am needing. i am not making choices to gain their favor ... we are keeping the rules the same. but i have gotten to a point where i am really angry with them and just hurting because they want to have nothing to do with me when their dad is home. and even when he is gone the questions are 'when is dad getting home? will dad take us? can we call dad? ...'. it does hurt. after all the investment, i don't even expect to be the 'favorite' ... i am just hoping not to be constantly second choice or invisible. it has been years. 4 years ... my husband i remember a birthday when it all really started, 'no i want to hold daddy's hand' ... and then the dominos fall and all of them want him and throughout the day, i am told that i don't matter.

i know that i need to be strong. i am trying my best to be strong. isn't there a point when it is a family culture that is becoming set in stone. four years could turn into twenty, and then my only daughter is saying, 'mom, can you just pass dad the phone?' ... it feels like just the way it is going to be. so i guess my question is what to do? should we get family counseling? should i just eat it as long as it takes. it makes me want to go back to work to have some place where i am affirmed. i mean how much can someone take. it's like being in a job where you are constantly told you don't matter ... and it is a job you thought you would always love, but psychologically and emotionally it is taking a toll.

Always wanted children, then adopted and boy favors dad to me! How did this happen? Will he ever favor me more?
I wanted a child more, I was the one who suffered most being childless, and now the answer to my prayers doesn't love me the most??
Not that he doesn't love me, but at the end of the day after playing with him, feeding him, bathing him, reading a story, he wants Daddy to sleep with him! How do I deal with this? When he cries he cries for Daddy.
Am I so unloveable, so fake, that a child can see thru me and reject me? Only put up with me until the real prize shows up? Can someone please tell me something that will give me hope in this situation?
I have been trying for 2 years now and still daddy is the favorite

I have been experiencing this for several months now, my daughter is two and a half. I am a SAHM and I too wonder whether I shouldn't be back at work where I will find more affirmation of my merits. I have some pride in my merits as a mother, but what's the use if the one who should be approving them doesn't seem to. My husband is a good father, too, btw.

I am a divorced mom of a 5 year old. My ex and I have joint custody and have a very amicable relationship and communicate almost daily about our child. We have been divorced for 3 years. Recently our daughter has taken to putting up a big show at pick up time. She stands firm refusing to go with my ex-husband. I can see how hurt and upset he is at this behaviour. Not really knowing how to react in this situation, I told her to "stop this" picked her up and physically moved her out of the door and gave her a little push toward him. As I closed the door, I could hear her crying which upset me and angered me that she had placed us in this awkward position. I'm not sure how to handle this situation as it has now happened twice. I don't want to make my daughter feel badly by telling her this upsets her daddy, but I don't think shoving her out the door is the answer either, as I don't want her to think I'm kicking her out.

This article was very helpful...especially the part about a parents focus being on creating an environment where the child can grow into a healthy individual and also the part about the job of affirming parent isn't the childs...thank you

I too can painfully relate to this.
I am a new mother of an adopted 3 yr old boy and although he shows affection and love to me one-on-one,he often asks where his daddy is, asks for him when he gets any injury and gives him spontaneous hugs and kisses and tells him he loves him regularly.
He wants him to put him to bed, he wants to sit up in the couch with him. He tells me he wants daddy to do this or that, and with attitude!
what can I do? I want to tell him to stop asking for daddy or saying he wants daddy for this or that, but i dont know if it is because I dont want to hear it or he really should not be allowed to voice his preference with such attitude.